Angela's Pursuit
by Ltldogduff
Summary: Angela Edmunds [Chase's baby, yeah.] is now 14 and finally on her own adventure to find the father and grandfather that she'd been kept from all of her life.  Join her in her pursuit of her family.  Reviews will decide how far this story goes.
1. Chapter 1

At a comfortable home in Visalia, California, if you were to look up at one of the upstairs windows, you would find the face of a dark haired, fourteen year old girl looking out over the front lawn. Further observation would confirm that the small, fragile girl had been crying, although she would never admit it, not even to herself.

She wore a comfy t-shirt and a figure complimenting pair of dark but faded blue jeans, undoubtedly her favorite pair. Although it was summertime and she didn't have school, the girl was as pale as winter made all, and looking at her one assumed that she was generally the bookworm sort who spent the summer doing assignments that her teachers gave her and reading the new Harry Potter book. One would be surprised to find that her character was quite contrary to her appearance.

Angela. Angela Edmunds was her name. She lived with her mother, whom she fought with constantly. About the teenager sort of things, like boys and clothing, but Angela was always looking for an argument mainly because of her mom's strict restraint of Angela from her father, although being a strong, sure soul wouldn't admit it unless she felt like doing so.

But the restraint didn't stop at her father. Her mom had been sure to keep her away from her granddad as well. That was really 'it' on the family side as far as Angela knew. Her mother told her that everyone else was dead.

Now, Angela was thinking about what her mother said about both her dad and her grandfather. She was about twelve when her mother had finally come around to telling her that she wasn't really her mother and about everyone else who she had been kept from for all of her life.

"_Angela, I'm not really your mom," the pained voice echoed in her brain as though it were only a week ago. _

She didn't really understand at first, but as soon as she'd found out the complications of her mother giving her up and her father running away to be an agent all over again, she didn't want her mom. But her dad…her dad had tried, right? Maybe he'd want her if she gave him the chance. And her grandfather; he was a bad dad, but he'd never been given the chance at being a granddad.

"_What was his name?" she had asked, soaking up every detail of the conversation that she could._

"_Chase Edmunds," came a cold, hurt reply._

And about her granddad, and why her mother hated them:

"_The place that they worked was horrible. People died everywhere you turned. All sorts of people, even the good guys. CTU is…" she couldn't seem to find the exact words to describe it. Eventually she dropped it, and continued, "Your grandfather pushed any and everyone who tried to get close to him away for his job. For an agent, he was very dedicated. Truthfully, the best of the best. However, being an agent was more important to him than being a dad, and…" her mom broke off for a moment to regain her composure, carefully selecting the right words. "And there's something very wrong with that. If that's the way he is as a dad, than I don't want your heart broken when he's not a good granddad,"_

"_And his name?" she'd pressed for more._

"_Jack. Jack Bauer," came the firm reply._

And that was it. There was to be no more discussion after that, her mom had made that very clear. But Angela had a yearning to know more than what her mom could tell her.

Angela stood up, as if in a final decision. She knew whom to call. She packed a bag of things she might want or need on her journey, a jacket, her life savings, her cell phone, a notebook and pen, and a camera.

Before putting the notepad and pen in her bag, she wrote her mom a note:

_Mom,_

_I'm all right. You say that I wouldn't want to know my dad and granddad, but you're wrong, because I do. You say it was wrong to be deprived of your dad for all of those years that he was so distant that he wasn't there at all, right? My dad's not here at all, either, mom, and you're depriving me of my dad just like you were yourself. You say that you do this for my safety, both physical and emotional. But I can't stand not knowing any longer. I'm going to find out for myself and make my own mistakes. I'm sorry, I am, but please understand that I need to do this._

_Love you,_

_Angela_

Satisfied, she left it on her bedside table. She slung her bag around her neck, and walked out of her room.

"Mom," she called on her way down the stairs, "I'm going to go for a little walk to the park. Is that alright?"

"Sure, just be back in time for dinner," Agreed her blonde-haired mother.


	2. Chapter 2

Angela had been trained well. After figuring out what a job included at CTU, she had done tons of research and become a junior agent herself. She knew, with help from the stories her mother told that they could track cell phones by the SIM cards, and would take hers out and try to get a new one first thing.

She wanted to be an agent there, just like her dad and grandfather. It sounded like just the challenge for such a high-spirited girl. She was prepared to make the sacrifices that her mom had assured her most of all would come. She knew that this was what she wanted.

Had her mother known this, she would not have allowed her daughter to become a black belt in karate and an expert in self-defense and offense, for that matter. Truthfully, Angela was more serious about this than she was about anything else, but knowing her mom would object, she'd made herself an undercover alias, except with the same name. Ever since her mom had given her that talk, she'd been undercover, finding out as much information about CTU as possible.

Now, her mission was almost over. She just had to find her dad, and she knew just where to start.

She took out her cell phone as she headed across the park to the other side where there was a highway, and dialed as she went. Once, when her mom was out, Angela had snooped around until she found something CTU-worthy. It was Chloe O'Brian's work number. Angela was confident that Chloe would be able to help her. Partly because analysts had access to all that sort of thing, but also because she'd heard Chloe tell her mom once before that she could find Chase for her. Of course, being her mother, she'd refused, saying that she was over him, but she wasn't, Angela could definitely tell. Chloe would be able to track Chase Edmunds down…and tell her about her granddad.

"CTU, O'Brian," said a familiar, bored voice from her cell phone.

Angela straightened up and talked with a purposeful voice. "Hi, this is Angela Edmunds. I have very good reason to believe that you know how to find my dad, Chase Edmunds,"

"Angela…you shouldn't have called me. Does your mom know about this?" Chloe O'Brian was obviously very grouchy and intolerant of kids.

"Do you really think she would've consented me to do this? Look, Chloe. I'm out here on my own for a few days. My mom has kept Chase and my granddad from me for all of my life, alright, and I really don't appreciate the lecture," Chloe was very good at the comeback game, but Angela was putting up a good fight.

"Yeah, yeah, alright, fine. I'll find your dad for you…Jack's out in the field right now, but I'll have him call this number as soon as-"

Angela was quick to interrupt. "No, as soon as my mom finds out about this, she'll use every resource available to get me from finding my dad. She doesn't want me to turn out like him. I'm going to find the cheapest phone I can and call you from that number, and take the SIM card out of this one."

"Um…alright," she was obviously impressed. "…Your dad is stationed at CTU, San Francisco. It looks like he's been living in an apartment alone. Would you like his home address and number as well as the address and contact to CTU?"

"Sure, thank you," Angela agreed easily, amazed at how easily this was happening. She took out her notebook and pen and wrote down the addresses and phone numbers that Chloe provided her with.

"Chloe, thanks for everything. But…"

It was Angela's turn to be interrupted. "I'm not going to tell your mom. We didn't leave things so hot, and, for the record, I think she should've given your dad a chance. We were good friends your dad's a good guy…and I know your grandfather, Jack, really well too. Good luck, Angela."

"Thanks,"

And then she immediately took the SIM card out of her phone. Now, she couldn't be tracked.

_Transportation. _ This thought had entered her mind now that she was at the other end of the park, by the highway. Her good friend, Dana, had grandparents in San Francisco. And not only that, but she had a driver, meaning unlimited access to the car to take her anywhere. Angela could sweet-talk Dana into taking her there.

She jammed the SIM card back into her phone and called Dana, who just loaned Angela her driver. She couldn't believe how smoothly this was going. "There's gotta be a catch," she thought, dazed.

In just ten minutes, Dana's driver was there, at which time, the SIM card came out for good.

"Do you know the area?" she asked her, after explaining the location.

"I grew up right around there, it shouldn't be a problem," she'd smiled.

The trip was long and boring. She tried to count her way there, all the minutes gone by, but ended up falling asleep around lunchtime, just ten minutes after she'd left. She woke up three hours later.

"Um…could you stop at an AT&T along the way, please? I need a new phone, mine broke, and I know that my dad won't want to pay for it." Angela lied smoothly. She wasn't sure who she'd inherited the good liar gene from, but her mom seemed too truthful. Biased, yes, but truthful.

"Certainly. There's one right in the area." Dana's driver replied amiably.

"Piece of cake much?"She smiled to herself.

In another hour and a half they'd stopped for food and bathroom, and then she'd been driven to the AT&T, where she easily got by with a new phone on a new number.

So far, everything had been way easier than expected, probably because she was lucky and not guilty at all. Not for running away, not for getting this far, and certainly not for using Dana's driver, nope, she knew she needed to do this, and her mom would, with time, eventually come to understand that.

And then?

"We're here," said the driver.

"Thank you so much for everything!!" Angela exclaimed.

And there she was, looking up at the place that would, either way this whole thing went change her life forever. She was about to find her dad, find out if he still loved her or if he really didn't care.


	3. Chapter 3

She went in the revolving door and quickly found the bathroom. She called Chloe from the new phone.

"CTU, O'Brian," there it was again, the bored drone. Jeez, what was she doing over there all day?! Of all of the careers that CTU offered, she was certain now that she was _not_ going to be an analyst.

"It's Angela, have my granddad call me from this number, alright?"

"He's right here now. I'll transfer you over to his station," Chloe seemed pretty eager to get Angela out of her hair. She'd probably had a long day.

Angela was breathless. Finally she could talk to Jack; to her grandfather!

"Yeah," a deep masculine voice answered. It sounded unfortunate to her.

"Uuh…Jack?" Angela didn't know what to say now. Here she was, she could tell him anything, everything. But would he want to hear it? Here on her mission, the only impediment was that she didn't know if her dad or granddad would want to know her. Or maybe it wasn't so much of the matter of them wanting her, but more if she would even want them…probably both.

"Yeah," He was obviously a man of little words.

"I'm Angela. Edmunds. You-your granddaughter…" She stuttered hopelessly. There was something else in his voice. He sounded…unpredictable to any reaction. This frightened her a little.

There was silence on the other end of the line. "Did Kim give you this number?" he finally asked her quietly. Now his tone was soft and nurturing, like love and protection, although rugged around the edges.

"No, she still wouldn't let me talk to you. I-I had to know. If you were really like she says you are. She's depriving me of, not only my dad, but also you. I found Chloe's number and knew she'd be able to help me; she's the one person from CTU that my mom would let me near and…and here I am." She finished. It wasn't totally her image of the way things would go, but it was close enough. She'd wished things would have gone in person that way, she'd know what they looked like. But this was all right with her.

"I figured that. So you're…"

"In San Francisco. At the apartment complex that my dad lives at," she finished off for him.

"Did you run away?"

"I guess you could call it that, except I was planning on going back after I found out the truth. Jack, I'd never tell mom this, but I want to be like you. And my dad. I'd found out everything about your job, what you did. It's…it's what I know I want to do. I've been through karate, black belt…I know the way this stuff works, and…"

At that moment, two men thudded into the women's restroom (talk about ironic) and went for her. She was a bit surprised and confused, but said a quick, "Hold on," into the phone. One attempted to grab her around the waist. She chopped him on the shoulder and kicked him where it hurt. The other man came at her from behind. She did a front flip in the air and kicked him right under the jaw, rendering him unconscious. She'd been told many times that the most vulnerable spot on the body was the neck, but she'd never actually seen the theory in action. The other man made another attempt, apparently recovering from the recent hit, but by that time, she'd reached the door and ran for her life.

"ANGELA?!" Her grandfather began calling her name into the phone. "_So he does care," _she thought as her legs carried her, farther, farther, farther away from that wretched bathroom.

"Jack, I'm okay, I just got attacked, and one guy is running after me, I managed to knock out the other one. I'm running up to my dad's apartment now. Oh, pray with me that he's home!!"

"Angela, do not take the elevator," Maybe he didn't really understand the part about knowing about those sort of agent things…that or at least underestimated it.

"Did you hear anything I just said?? I know this stuff! If I went up the elevator, he'd meet me at the top. Believe me when I say that I'd be considered a junior field agent." She was out of breath from running up the stairs, right up to the fifth floor and on to room 520. Her bag was swinging and hitting her leg, therefore getting very annoying, but that didn't stop her any.

She banged as hard as she could on the door until it opened, and she basically fell in, and forced the door shut.

"You there?" Jack's voice on the other line was hard to concentrate on at the sight that beamed triumphantly before her.

There, right in front of her, so close that she could feel his breath, was the madman who had been chasing her around the apartment building.


	4. Chapter 4

Well, this place had definitely set her record for the fastest elevators in history. With her quick reflexes, all she had to say was, "You idiot," before doing a kick at him and getting him low enough to render him unconscious by location of the neck.

She stood there out of breath for a few seconds, bewildered at how quickly this whole thing was really unfolding. It was the strands of sound coming from the phone in her hand that shook her away. She never took the eyes off of the man.

"Jack," came her soft voice. "Jack, he tried to capture me,"

"What? Chase did?" he was quite confused about that.

Now the hot tears came. Her dad loved her enough to capture her violently. She nodded, forgetting for a second that that could only be interpreted as silence on the other end.

"Angela?" Now his voice was soft again. "I'll identify him for you. Text a picture to 555-5555 for me so I can confirm it's him. Go and check all of the rooms, and make sure you are alone in the apartment, and also, do whatever you need to for when he wakes up," he instructed in a leader-ly sort of way.

She slowly fished her old phone out of her bag, her hazel eyes still wide and wet at the unconscious body before her. She took a picture of him. Him, who left her and her mom. Him, who never thought to stop in and give a reason. Him, who thought that CTU was more important than his family.

Maybe it really does tear people apart… 

And so, the SIM card was put back in, the picture texted, the phone turned off, and the card removed once again. And she didn't talk to Jack. The silence, with his deep breathing held more comfort to her than actually talking. He said that he needed to do something for a minute, muttering an excuse, something to do with where he left his cell phone. They hung up, with a promise from him that the man right outside the door would be confirmed.

Suddenly, her surprise and sadness turned into anger. She couldn't look at him for another second. She grabbed him by the feet and flung him outside into the hallway, positioned as though in a deep sleep. She closed the door on him and secured the deadbolt, and began a search of the apartment.

Angela found that she was in a comfortable living room. It had a TV, a table, a couch…everything a normal living room should have. There was a remote for the TV and stereo system on the table, but other than that, nothing. Desperate for something, she felt in-between the couch cushions, but all she found were a couple of cinnamon candy wrappers, and what looked like an old, shriveled to the point of nothingness, grape. Men…

There was a doorway that led to a kitchen and dining area. Again, everything was completely…normal, and it didn't really look as though anyone had occupied the place. She had the fleeting impression that he ate and slept at the apartment, but never actually lived there. There was no real individuality about the place. Just an apartment. Dishes were loaded in the sink, towering towards the ceiling, and some toward the bottom were so moldy and smelly that it was a wonder he didn't just get it over with and load them into the dishwasher. In-between the two counters there was a pantry, of which was stacked high with potato chips, junk food, cereal, Ramen noodles, and some more of those cinnamon candies. On the counter there was a pile of opened mail, boring bills and reminders and such. She opened the door to what was apparently where he did his laundry, right behind the table.

"_Right, so he does the laundry, but yet when it comes to the dishes, he just lets them dwell in the sink," _she thought irritably.

He seemed to like t-shirts. She found jeans and went through the pockets, but was very disappointed to find only more cinnamon candy wrappers, and what looked like it was once a tissue.

She moved out of the kitchen, across the living room and into what looked like the only bedroom. There was a painting hung above the master bed of fire, splattered with red and orange, a little yellow, it was the only hint to Angela about his personality. He had very plain furniture, all of it light wood. The spread on his bed was a khaki-colored down blanket, and he put tons of pillows on for good measure.

Unbalanced as it seemed with such a big bed, there was only one nightstand, in which she found more of the cinnamon candies, and the only personal item of his yet: a picture of (Angela's heart skipped a beat) her mom holding her when she was very little. He was not in the picture…maybe he took it. They were in the park by her house, and her mother had a look that she'd never seen her wear. Her eyes, shone, her blonde hair seemed to blow happily in the breeze, and she had the first genuine smile she'd ever seen her mom wear. Oh, she was in love. Angela realized for the first time how much they all had missed out on so many happy times that Chase could've spent with them instead of at CTU.

In her sudden gratitude for her father, she sat down on the bed and smelled one of the pillows. She knew that smell. Sometimes it lingered in the air at home for split seconds at a time, and then it was gone, but it was always there, and she found it rather calming. It was his smell. A soft smile caressed her face. She carefully put the picture out on the nightstand so he could see it. Maybe then he could get a clue.

There was a desk with a laptop and a lot of jotted notes and more of those obsessive cinnamon candies scattered all over it. Looking in the drawers proved misleading, so she began to look at the notes. Some were passwords for CTU, others what looked to be usernames and passwords of different people that he'd probably needed at times, for whatever reasons.

She tried to boot the laptop up, but as it would take awhile, she began to prod some more in his room. She'd looked in the bathroom, but found this a waste of time. He barely owned more than to shave and brush his teeth, and maybe take a proper shower.

Angela was turning to the closet with the sliding doors as her phone rang.

"Hello?" she answered immediately.

"Angela," her grandfather's voice was on the other end. "That was not your dad,"

"Really?" A spurt of hope bubbled in the pit of her stomach. She sat down on the bed. "It's not?"

"No. I'm having Chloe investigate it right now." He seemed less depressed and more like he'd called her for a cheerful chat to see what she'd been doing lately.

She liked the sound of this. Sometimes, she would be over at one of her friend's houses and meet their grandparents, or they would talk on the phone to them, and their grandparents would want to know what they were doing in school and if they got in trouble... Finally she had the chance to be one of those kids, even though Jack hardly sounded like the sort to want to know how school had been going.

"That's great," Angela enthused.

She had gotten up to begin searching the closet. The color slowly seeped out of her happy face. Her breathing became hardly anything at all. The track of the sliding doors was trickling a slow stream of death-red blood.

"Jack," she breathed, barely audible.

She'd seen blood before. Blood was blood, a simple fact of life, but the fact that it was running in a stream, as though there was a whole lot, and the fact that it was coming out of the closet, as though the closet itself was bleeding, was quite repulsing to her.

"Yeah," he said. It seemed to be his favorite word. It was a good word, she decided, since you didn't have to face anything directly with it. It was just 'yeah'.

"Blood," she whispered. She could feel him tensing up.

With a surge of bravery that came from somewhere she didn't know, she took steps at a time towards the closet, each time her foot hit the ground felt like an hour gone by. She reached toward the door, expecting something to jump out at her at any minute, like at a haunted house of some sort, but nothing did. The trickle of blood just kept coming; her hand just kept moving closer to the door. She touched the cool surface, and slowly slid the door open.

Her eyes were closed. She didn't want to see what was being hidden in the closet.

She didn't want to know anymore, she felt sick. The wave of nausea passed as she collected her breath. Angela opened one hazel eye, and saw him. She didn't know how she knew, but she did. Perhaps it was the familiarity, or else the instinct only his blood daughter could have, either way, she knew the man splayed in the closet was him. It was the dad that she'd been waiting her whole life to see, to understand. The wound, to her great relief, was from a simple pocketknife, judging from the fact that the owner didn't bother to take it out. The wound was deep, but not something that couldn't be helped.

She opened her other eye and felt his pulse, just to make sure. Yes, she could feel the thud from his neck. Her first breath as a Girl with a Father escaped her in relief. She couldn't help him with him lying tucked away in a closet. Tenderly, she dragged him out from beneath a rack of low-hanging clothes.

Through the whole thing, she had become deaf at the noise coming from the cell phone.

Jack's deep, rugged voice had become something in another language to her. It took her a minute to translate.

"Found him," she told him so he would stop asking her so many questions and let her take care of her father. "In his own closet, pocket knife wound, alive, nothing serious, although unconscious for unknown reasons." She didn't feel like wasting her energy in complete sentences. He could understand, and that was all that seemed to matter at the moment.

Slowly, she pulled the knife out of his leg, careful to pull it at the exact angle that it was pushed, as not to inflict any damage to his leg.

She cleaned and bound his wound tightly and studied him carefully. He didn't have a hand, for some reason or another.

"Hand?" She questioned the phone.

"He had a…a type of crystalline virus bolted to him. I had to do it, he asked me to do it…" Jack vividly relived the moment in silence.

"Ah," She understood.

There was banging on the door of the apartment. Apparently someone had wakened up from his lovely nap. She closed the door to the bedroom and ignored it. She didn't really feel like dealing with him right at that moment.

"Jack, how can I…-" she began.

"Just wait, Angela, just wait," he soothed her.

Alright, well, I hope you liked that chapter…the main thing is I needed somewhere to stop, but there's a lot more where that came from…) Please R&R! (Have no idea what that means, but it seems to be that at least one of the R's is for review, so…)


	5. Chapter 5

Sure enough, Angela had finally found that she could do nothing more for her dad but wait, and did so, with a promise from Jack that he'd call to check on everything later. She had cleaned the blood from the closet the best she could, and set everything the way it was, except for the picture of her mom holding her. Since she had found her dad, she didn't really need the computer anymore, so she turned it back off.

Finally, she had been sitting in the living room, watching TV, when she heard movement in the other room.

He was tall, and very handsome. She saw his eyes were hers, and so was his nose. Her other features belonged to her birth (but by no means, any other sort of one to her) mother.

"Dad?" Something in Jack's voice made her want to call him 'Jack', not 'Grandpa' or something, because he didn't sound like a grandpa. He sounded like simply, Jack.

But Chase didn't look like he would mind being called dad after he got used to it. She just sensed that.

Angela took small steps through the doorway and stopped. She had heaved him up on the bed, and saw that he was sitting up, looking confused. His expression matched the feeling of waking up and not quite remembering exactly how you got there, like when you went on a trip or something.

"Huh?"

"I'm…Angela. Your daughter,"

There was a silence with so much awkwardness and confusion from both, that there was an impression there that they had too many questions to ask at once. And so the father's hazel eyes looked into his daughter's with a feeling one couldn't quite name, and said with a blow of utter bewilderment.

"Angela?"

"Yeah," (It was a rather good word. "_Kudos to Jack,_" she thought.)

"What…why…how…?" He was so confused when he had just woken up. Not like his long lost daughter was helping any.

"I ran away from home. I couldn't take not knowing you or Jack anymore. You're my dad," She breathed the last sentence with such emotion that one would have looked up to make sure that she wasn't crying. "And mom says that you don't care. But how am I supposed to know if it's true or not? I had to find out for myself,"

He was silent. He plopped his head back on the pillow.

She gave him a little bit for his mind to catch up with the time.

"How did you end up unconscious in a closet?" she asked him conversationally, almost sarcastically, but her attentive eyes stopped the sarcasm in its tracks.

He stared at her for a minute and shook his head, with the slight ghost of a smile that plainly told her that she was just like her dad. "I came home from work at CTU, that's-"

She cut him off coolly, "I'm aware of what CTU is. I've only spent the last two and a half years of my life trying to be like you and find out everything about that place and become a sort of agent myself."

He sat there with his mouth slightly open, taken aback by how simply upfront she was being. "Uh, yeah, that's great!" He congratulated. "…As I was saying, I come home from work and some psycho is in my apartment. I fought him, but being off duty, I didn't have any weapons, so it was all hand to hand until he brought out a pocketknife. And then…he got me vulnerable enough to put a cloth over my mouth and nose and it was over,"

Angela nodded. "I was chased around the building from the bathroom by two men, both of which I knocked out long enough to get away. I thought…" she took a deep breath and continued. "I thought that he was you. My dad, I mean…he sorta cornered me…"

Chase nodded in understanding.

"I don't really understand why they were trying to capture me. What did I do?" she questioned in that casual-but-not-so sort of way.

"No idea," he shrugged carelessly.

"So, let me get this straight: I'm supposed to believe that you have no idea why these guys were chasing me around AND taking control of your apartment AND knocking you out? There's got to be something they were after," Angela thought out loud.

"Well, I have a bunch of CTU data on the laptop. They were probably after that." He said with a wave of his hand.

Angela nodded knowingly. He was a bad liar, or at least he was to someone who didn't know him. She'd try a different approach…

"Mom misses you. She says she's let go, but she hasn't. Truthfully, I haven't seen her as happy as she was in that-" she motioned to the picture on the nightstand. "-Ever."

She watched his eyes for the signs. They flickered over to the picture, with such a desperate look that she had trouble going on. Her insides were doing a happy dance. He still cared. He still _wanted_ to care. He still loved. She fought back the smile that wanted to roll onto her lips.

"What do you have to say for leaving? You broke her heart. By doing so, you not only pushed her away, but me, too. You're my dad! I've never known you. But apparently CTU is more important than me. And mom."

Oh, yes, he was softening up. She would get the truth. He knew why those guys wanted to capture her, and she was going to find out, even if it meant the dramatic tear fest.

But Chase said nothing. And so Angela began to cry passionately, "So why is that, huh, dad? Why have you never bothered to stop in? Do you really not love me, do you really not care?"

So she was going against what she believed in, but after two fake tears slid down her cheeks as though they were mere hills of snow, it paid off.

"Angela," he said softly. "I never wanted it to be like this,"

And so he told her the story, her mouth and eyes widening the deeper he went into it. After forty-five minutes or so, he was finished, and she said in an unusually forceful voice, "You're telling mom. You're telling her all of this." Chase opened his mouth to retort, but she cut him off, "And neither of us will take no for an answer,"

Jack called right on time at that point and she picked up the phone.

"Yeah, Angela, can I talk to your dad?"

"Sure," she uncertainly made to give her phone to her dad, but stopped midway, and told Jack, "There's more to it than you know," and handed the phone over.

They talked for a minute, Chase's eyes looking sometimes desperate of retort, others on the verge of a laugh, and then sometimes quite terrified. She wondered briefly what sort of threats Jack must be throwing at him.

Finally, he handed the phone back to her, and Jack said, "Angela?"

"Yeah?"

"I'm coming with you when Chase talks to Kim,"

"Okay," was all she needed to say, and then they hung up.

By then it was nighttime, and much too late to drive all the way to Visalia, and it would be much later still to tell all of this to her mom, so he helped her bring out the couch-bed and then said, "Goodnight, Angela," and she replied, "'Night Dad,"

And they both had happier dreams than they'd had in a long, long time.


	6. Chapter 6

Angela sighed, yawned, and stretched. Sunlight made two blocks of steady yellow on the carpet, giving the distinct impression that today would be a good day, and no matter what happened, it would continue to be a good day because it began a good day, and so it simply was.

She was wearing an oversized t-shirt to sleep in that her dad had lent her without a second thought. Angela realized for the first time that she didn't have but one set of clothes with her. She'd just have to wear the same ones back home, where she could change. She pulled them back on, folded the couch bed back in very neatly, and then peeked into her dad's room. He hadn't bothered to put the picture away, she noticed first off, and he was still sleeping luxuriously, sprawled out, as though even a king-sized bed wasn't quite big enough for him.

She wondered absentmindedly if her dad had work today. If he did, then they'd get to her house later than she wanted. That was, until she remembered that it was Sunday, and so they could get started on the journey anytime. There was a clock in the kitchen, on the microwave, announcing that it was 9:34am. She found some cereal in the pantry, and helped herself to it, knowing her dad wouldn't mind. Angela was surprised at just how hungry she was, when she realized that in the midst of everything that was happening, neither her nor her father had bothered a stray thought for dinner. She gulped down the last of the milk in her bowl. Yeah, it was impolite and she knew it, but she'd always taken to doing it for some reason or another.

"You're just like your father," she spun around to find that her dad had woken up. She smiled and laughed silently. "Yeah, well, I try," she replied with a shrug.

He took the cereal box from in front of her and poured himself a bowl.

"I was thinking that we should get going pretty quickly." He made the statement sound casual, but she could tell that it had bigger impact than it meant. It was almost as though he was uncomfortable giving orders to her, like he didn't want to blow it. And yet, she could tell that he liked it. It was like CTU away from CTU. And because CTU was really all that was in his life…well, there you go.

"Alright," she replied easily.

They sat there, both enjoying the silence of the apartment, the only sounds being Chase's crunching of cereal and the air conditioner, which both would admit that it was nice to have such a silence after the day they'd endured the previous day.

"Should I call and warn her that we're coming?" she asked with an unsure gesture to the phone in which the number her mom knew.

Her dad hesitated. They were on a highway, just outside of San Fransisco. "Yeah, just make it quick. A minute or longer and we can be triangulated."

"Okay,"

And then the SIM card made its way back into her phone and she quickly called her mom.

She picked up on the first ring. "Angela?"

"Hi," she started. "Mom, uh, I got a ride back there. I think-"

She hesitated for a moment. Her dad had explained that if her mom knew that he and Jack were coming, she might try to run or something stupid like that. "I think you should get ready to have some company."

"Who?"

"Mom, I've gotta go," Angela started. "I love you!" she chanted over her mom's voice, which was protesting that she'd a right to know after all of this.

Angela hung up, and made the phone invulnerable once more.

"Does she suspect anything?" Chase asked this as though it was the most normal thing in the world, and Angela got the lasting impression that he said it a lot.

"Well, she has her theories and her nightmares," she explained. She needn't have said this, for she knew that Chase knew it as well as she did.

Needless to say he was nervous. From the time he stepped into the kitchen that morning, he was nervous. There was sweat on his brow that formed irritatingly every half an hour, and he had only half of his brain on the road in front of him. Luckily, however, he had a smart enough half of a brain that could drive well. The best part was that even though he was off-duty, he was still allowed to speed, although he didn't do it very much over the limit.

"Are we meeting Jack?" She asked him.

"Yeah, he asked me to pick him up," It took him awhile to answer. He was probably going over the best- and worst-case scenarios of the meeting in his mind.

Three and quarter hours later Chase pulled over on a street corner. There was a man there, with a heavy-set look about him. He had honey-colored hair and forever hurt and hollow eyes. It didn't take her too long to realize who he was. He had unmistakable parts of her mom, except for those ever-unhappy eyes. She wondered what all they had seen, what all they want to see, and what made them so aggrieved.

Chase went out to greet him. They shook hands politely, but the look in each of their faces was priceless, like two young boys who were just told that Christmas had come five months early.

Her dad made a motion to her to get out of the car, and so she did.

She was suddenly shy. What was going through each man's head at the moment? Her small feet carried her up to both of them.

Jack smiled at her with his mouth, and even his sad eyes gave a twinkle.

He pulled her into a bone-crushing hug. Angela briefly wondered if she would ever recover for she was sure she'd been smashed like a spider.

_What a sight we must be! _She thought with a slight smile. But for once, she didn't care what she looked like, being crushed by some macho man on a sidewalk in Visalia. Nor did she care when her dad took his turn, although his hug was much more tendered than Jack's.

Then, the reunion was cut harshly short, as they realized they'd better get going. The three loaded the car and drove to the home that Angela and her mother, and for a short time, even her long-lost-and-yet-found dad had occupied.


End file.
